#2 The story of time travelling to achieve perfection
In Lopaka, pixel perfection is key. To achieve it, use fonts from the library & connect them in the browser. Sounds easy, right? But finding the right font format can be a challenge. Ran into issues with font clarity and letter spacing when using U8g2 library on OLED.
This led me to a deep dive into BDF converters, forgotten repositories, and old-looking websites. Finally, FontForge worked! It was tough to understand the UI, but it delivered the results. Pixel perfection achieved in the browser. But, the journey wasn't over.
Next challenge: adding support for Adafruit GFX. The default font, GLCD, was hard to trace. Adafruit documentation didn't mention the font used.
Found a way to parse the GLCD font by converting a C++ array into a full-fledged font using a tool. But, the formats didn't match & the classic font lacked a list of glyphs.
Finally, a kind soul on a forum had converted the correct version with all the glyphs. But, there was no way to export to BDF. The search for a universal converter continued.
Despite attempts, creating a converter from an 8-bit array to a universal format was too complex. A journey that took us back to 1988 when BDF was invented for use on magnetic tapes.
BDF is really lossy, the fancy stuff isn't going to do it in one step, there were a couple converters in the debian/fedora repositories, one is otf2bdf, did that not work or was it like a shareware hunt
This is the "standard 5x7 font" https://eleif.net/HD44780.html mentioned here
It has a story of its' own but i don't remember the wild tangent that could get me back to those sources. it's the type of thing that was printed by itself in a databook in the late 60s http://hparchive.com/PARTS/HP-LEDs-5082-710x.pdf because you were expected to supply the character generator with your software.
No success so far… I’m afraid we cannot have an Adafruit font... or can?
The situation seemed bleak, but the open-source community came through. A person was found who helped to solve a problem, even providing a ready-made solution! We finally managed to write a script to produce an SVG and used it to generate a TrueType font. Now, the rare exotic GLCD font is finally available online in TrueType form. Check our github. This is the magic of an open source project.
We connected via Telegram, where I shared my secret layouts of the new Lopaka design and future plans. He shared ideas about improvements. He was so inspired, he rewrote the project structure in just a few days
A significant contributor to this transformation was Denis, also known as deadlink. His work was crucial in enhancing Lopaka, making it a robust tool for developers and designers.
This journey from initially poor font clarity to achieving pixel-perfect fonts illustrates the importance of perseverance and community collaboration in the Lopaka project. It highlights how people, rather than just technology, are central to our success.